榊原鍵吉

Sakakibara Kenkichi (1830–1894) was the fifteenth headmaster of Jikishinkage-ryū and sword instructor to the last shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu — and he became the savior of kenjutsu in the Meiji era through a brilliant act of reinvention. When the Meiji government's reforms dismantled the samurai class and banned swords in 1876, kenjutsu faced extinction. Sakakibara's solution was the 'gekiken kōgyō' (striking sword exhibition): public kenjutsu matches performed before paying audiences, effectively Japan's first martial arts spectacle. He gathered the finest swordsmen of the age, and ultimately arranged an imperial viewing before the Meiji Emperor himself — cementing kenjutsu's social legitimacy in the new era. His motto — 'kenjutsu without a real sword is like a tree without flowers' — expressed his insistence that kata with live blades remained the soul of the art, even as shinai sparring attracted the crowds. He died in 1894, just as the Dai-Nippon Butokukai was being formed to institutionalize his legacy into modern kendō.